Its better then last year. You couldn't preorder the nes mini, stores had 3 times the supply, the controller comes bundled, and even though the SNES mini cost 20 dollars more then the Nes mini the Ebay Prices for the Nes Mini were more then the SNES Mini from last year. Personally Im waiting for supply to hit demand so I can get the European version. The scalpers seems like they bought like a 1/4 of them.

Neverhoodian:It seems like everyone has different stories about availability. It probably varies depending on where you live. I'd imagine major cities got the lion's share of units at launch, with outlying areas having to settle for the leftovers.

I haven't even bothered trying to get one yet. I figure I'll wait a week or so and see if I can get one via store walk-in. I'd like to obtain one, but not to the point that I'd be willing to wait in line for hours during the early morning (prime sleeping time for me given my 1-9 p.m. work schedule) just to have a chance at getting it.

Elvis Starburst:You know, I see a lot of people mentioning stores running out of SNES minis, and saying they aren't restocking. The thing JUST came out, do you have any idea of how ordering stock even works? It doesn't ship in a day, it takes a bit of time. A store isn't gonna run out, and then immediately look outside and say "Oh look, the re-stock truck is here!" Like... chill out, give it a few days or even a week

Exactly. I work at a major retailer, and it usually takes a few days to restock an item if we sell out quickly. This applies to all merchandise, from the hottest electronics to hand soap.

I said this earlier but there's a rumor that stores like Walmart, BB Target and GS limit stock based on if that area is considered a poor area to limit theft.

Whoops, I missed your initial post. My bad.

I've only worked at a single store for my current job, so I can't claim to know if restock time differs depending on location. It wouldn't surprise me though. Another factor based on my anecdotal evidence is space. My store inherited its current building from another business, and it's far smaller than the norm. Simply put, we don't have the space to stock huge numbers of consoles on the sales floor or backroom.

I asked my local Gamestop how many extra they would get. They told me they'd have about 10 or 11 extra. By the time I got there in the morning there were ten people in line. I figured I had a decent shot of getting one and opted to wait. Turns out they had five extra.

I went across the street to Best Buy and saw people who I had already seen at Gamestop walking out empty handed and confirmed that Best Buy was out of stock. I didn't bother with any other stores as I had chores to do and saw no reason to think any other store would fare better.

I'm holding off on saying Nintendo is fucking up as I understand they supplied more and store will have more in stock soon.

Besides that, is anyone really surprised that Nintendo understocked on the SNES mini? I know I'm not. I wasn't even upset that I didn't get one. It was expected. I merely took a chance on getting one.

Kinda just tuned that out since it's clear by now NIntendo still hasn't done a lot to deal with the supply chain issue. . They like the media buzz that lines outside stores generate. But guess what Most smart people, well.. they remember that Emulators are a thing and have been around for years.

WHat's actually driving thsi and the NES classic I think is the scarcity. A psychological mind-hack.It may have no practical value but the fact that you have one and someone else doesn't is enough to make it valueable to someone.

Sorry Nintendo. Not gonna be a part of that. Especially when you realize how they cancelled the NES classic.

Considering the SNES hadn't been available for purchase for the last 10 years, I'm surprised you don't all already have emulated copies of the games you're seeking. That was what I turned to back in high school when my old SNES stopped working. I'd already paid for the original so no feelings of guilt there.

You can make the argument that shipping is hard, but then you have to remember that Nintendo has been in operation since I was a kid. I saw the rise of the actual NES. Now, tell me... After all these years, after all this time, can you really say that Nintendo can't punch up the numbers to figure out a proper amount of units? Hell, let's wipe away all but the last ten years of making, shipping, and selling devices and games. Do you think they don't know how to allocate all that is necessary by now, being a business whose job it is to do this very thing?

These are Classics, not 3DS devices. They're not immensely complicated things to build, nor should it be hard to send them about in proper numbers. There are only two explanations, friendly apologists, to repeatedly doing this with their products. Either they are truly inept at this game and just don't have the thought in their head to send more products after so many failures, or they do it for this BS artificial shortage plan which...makes no real sense, really. People are going to buy it anyway. Holding out just separates you from the money.

How many units do I think they can produce? MANY. More than this gasping cough. Nintendo has money and resources. So, unless the Classics are all powered by uranium, send 'em out. As for the store allocations, give me a break. If they haven't figured that out by now, then as I said, they're either idiots or pretending to be idiots. There's a difference between figuring out how much to send to places, and how much NOT to send out so that a ton of people never get product.

FalloutJack:Now, tell me... After all these years, after all this time, can you really say that Nintendo can't punch up the numbers to figure out a proper amount of units? Hell, let's wipe away all but the last ten years of making, shipping, and selling devices and games. Do you think they don't know how to allocate all that is necessary by now, being a business whose job it is to do this very thing?

well for starters, games, games consoles and merchandise come in all completely different shapes and sizes. do you think that Nintendo measure's exactly how much space, right down to the centremetre, for each different size and shape, just how much stock can fill within literally every singles stores storage room as well as on the shelves where the customers see do you?

yeah right. that's not Nintendo's job to work out how much stock they can stuff in literally every store. that's the retailers problem, they're the ones to work out how much stock they can hold and need to order. and just to make things even more fun and more complicated, pre order numbers literally go up and down all the time because some items are more highly sought after than others, so Nintendo and the retailer also need to work out how much demand there is for an item at the same time.

so no. no it's not just Nintendo's, or any other videogame console manufacturers job to work out much stock every single store can hold and how much demand for a system there is, it's ALSO the retailer's job to do that and they play a big role in helping the hardware supplier, in this case being Nintendo, work out exactly how big the demand for a product is and also how much stock the store can hold at any one time. Nintendo's main role there would to work out how much they can produce in a certain time and then work out how much of the amount that they produce, they can distribute even among stores where the stores with higher demand get more stock than the ones with no demand for a product.

let's use mcdonalds as an example. let's say a million people order and eat cheeseburgers at 1 mcdonalds store within a month, 500'000 people eat burgers at a 2nd store within a month, and the people in the 3rd city don't really like burgers. they just want fries so only 1000 burgers get eaten in a month at the third mcdonald's store.obviously the most burger patties will be sent by the supplier to the 2 stores that have had the most people buying and eating cheeseburgers during the month whereas not many people ate burgers during that month so they only send a small amount, let's say 1500 burger patties to the third store in the 2nd month.

BUT WAIT! all of sudden everything changes in the following month and the people living in the towns with the first to mcdonalds stores decide they hate burgers now and only 1000 people buy and eat cheeseburgers in the following month. but now everyone in the city with the 3rd store in it LOVES burgers now! there's 5 million people in the 3rd city that now want burgers but because noone bought and ate burgers at the store last month, they were only sent 1500 burger patties to stock the store, now there's millions of people who are mad because they missed out on getting a burger in the 2nd month because the 3rd store didn't order enough stock to account for that change in demand and the first 2 stores ended up being completely overstocked.

So to wrap up that completely weird and stupid sounding analogy, that can also be applied to videogame stores and consoles as well. with the NES mini and SNES mini. Nintendo and retailers didn't expect shitloads of people to want and buy their stock of the SNES mini so they underprodced it. they expected more to want the SNES mini so as many people in this thread have said already, they have provided retailers with much more stock than they had last time, but they also have to be careful, because they don't want to overstock either and then waste a lot of my by manufacturing and sending stock to stores that didn't need to be sent, like with the the Wii U

TL;DR. Nintendo should supply stores with more stock which is what they've done and they will continue to keep producing and restocking stores like they have already said they would. but they don't want and shouldn't overstock either and waste their time and money overstocking what didn't need to stocked.

I got to Target 15 minutes after it opened, got in a long line inside the store and got one day one. They said they had 140 or so this time, which isn't ideal, but a hell of an improvement over the NES Classic.

I was moving out of state and basically delayed my move by a few days in order to stake out my Target and Toys R Us. lol, priorities. People started lining up at Toys R Us, which opened at 10AM, the night before. Target opened at 8AM, I walked in at 815 and walked out at 845 or so.

Still haven't been able to sit down with it for more than 30 minutes because of the move, but boy am I a happy 11 year old again.

You know, your nice big speech aside, it is in fact Nintendo's stock-in-trade to do what I said they should be doing, because that is what would satisfy customers, the people who give them money. So yeah, they really should be knowing and doing all the stuff properly. You can argue with me, and you can argue the next time it goes wrong, and the next time, and the next time. The point will be that it keeps happening, and it will still be wrong. Don't PR the problem. Fix it.

You know, your nice big speech aside, it is in fact Nintendo's stock-in-trade to do what I said they should be doing, because that is what would satisfy customers, the people who give them money. So yeah, they really should be knowing and doing all the stuff properly. You can argue with me, and you can argue the next time it goes wrong, and the next time, and the next time. The point will be that it keeps happening, and it will still be wrong. Don't PR the problem. Fix it.

since you seem to think the problem is completely Black & White and as simple as saying "fix it" and hoping it magically gets fixed. then why don't you start your own videogame business and "fix it" then?

I'm not taking a black-and-white reaction. I'm taking a realistic one where after so many bloody failures, I cite that they don't have pattern recognition. You're the one making an extremist response. Really, so I should go into business for myself to make video games, huh? Not 'They should check their figures after like nine times wrong', but 'I have to go into business for myself just to prove I can math'. Well, smart guy, if I DID manage to get some kind of team together, I'd be on Steam. I like physical media, but I also have Steam games, and that one's easier to distribute, so that's good for a beginner. And there's the key point. I'd still be a beginner at game development, even playing it smart. Whereas Nintendo was up and about when I was a child. For the experienced, this should be less of a challenge. Not an arduous journey, more of a long and tedious one. Also, how dare you be mad at Queen for being in your head...

you say it's a realistic reaction. well if it's so easy to just "fix" then you do it.

FalloutJack:if I DID manage to get some kind of team together, I'd be on Steam. I like physical media, but I also have Steam games, and that one's easier to distribute, so that's good for a beginner. And there's the key point. I'd still be a beginner at game

So? if it's so easy to run a worldwide business then you do it and start a business if just "fixing" a stock problem with the snap of your fingers is THAT easy.

Like you said. Nintendo was up and about when you were in diapers and they're still going. the management there obviously knows alot more about how to run the business than you do.

You offer nothing in return here. And no, insults don't count. This is a math problem, and you just threw the standard and unfounded opinion that such-and-so knows what they are doing, despite not doing it repeatedly. That's pretty much the game, right there.

You offer nothing in return here. And no, insults don't count. This is a math problem, and you just threw the standard and unfounded opinion that such-and-so knows what they are doing, despite not doing it repeatedly. That's pretty much the game, right there.

i wasn't trying to insult you at all. i'm just pointing out that it probably isn't as black and white as you make it sound.